Awful Smell Coming from Heating Ducts - Please Help

We just bought a 1941 home and we recently had the heating ducts
cleaned and sanitized. The brush that the company used however was too
big to snake all the way through our duct system because the size of
some of our ducts is very small. Before and after the cleaning job, we
have had an odor that comes from the heat and appears to be most
pungent when their is rain or snow outside, but that could be a
coincidence.
Can anyone offer us any advice here?
Thanks,
Brian

Do you have a heat pump? Or is it a gas furnace. Brand & model # may
help. Need more information. Are ducts sheet metal? Lined or
un-lined? Ductboard? Flex?
How old is your system?
Another unhappy duct cleaning customer. Duct cleaning helps sometimes,
but is often done by hacks and is often overrated. I guess it didn't
fix your problem.
Stretch

Choose one: (or eliminate as many as you can)
Dead Animal
Dirty Clothes
Mold/Mildew
Burned
Chemical
Animal
Skunk
Cat box
Other Please describe
Try a new more efficient filter on the air intake (you will need to replace
more often as these clog more rapidly because they filter more stuff from
the air). Try spraying a can of lysol into the air intake while the fan is
running (heating or not). Move any plants or food storage or clothes hamper
away from the air intakes.
Good chance a thick layer of dust and sufficient humidity has allowed a
colony of bacteria or mold to form. If the brush couldn't get it out,
perhaps you can kill it without removing it with the Lysol or some kind of
UV light put in the duct (but if you couldn't get a brush everywhere, you
probably can't get a lamp in there also). If your ductwork is not metal, it
may be water damaged and decaying itself. It it exposed in the attic or
crawlspace, can you inspect it, maybe need to open a pipe in the middle to
clean the rest (ugly job, not recommended)

If related to precipitation your house must have a moisture leak that
must be located and repaired.
In order of ease of inspection:
Check if the furnace flue is hot and DRY, a too large flue for the
current furnace can get condensation inside it.
Then, the furnace's heat exchanger, especially if it's and old furnace,
ought to be checked for stress cracks - these allow combustion fumes to
enter the ducts - and your lungs. Use a flashlight and small mirror for
a look inside.
You need to inspect all, and not less than all, the ducts, including the
return, for water infiltration and disconnected joints.

Duct cleaning, is the single biggest scam, next to mold, in the industry.
Hope they gave you some sort of satisfaction warranty with their work..
If its a heat pump, you prob have one hell of a case of DSS, or Dirty Sock
syndrome.

I dont know about that... I had mine cleaned and there was 50 years of
shit
in them. I figured its better out than still in the system with me
breathing it
in.
They should really make some sort of filters for the intakes of the
system.
This would prevent so much crap from getting into the system in the
first place...
Tom

Intakes where the vents are located in the wall would do it. The
system already
has a good filtration system by the furnace. The bulk of the debree
that was in the system came from the intake side of the system.

Actually, they do.
And if the filter at the unit, if you have a multiple return system as in
so many older homes, is there, you are not breathing anything that isnt in
your home anyway.
Unless you have UV-C's, and a ventilator, (ERV, or a HRV) the air in your
homes worse than outside anyway...

Brian must be a female. Women, or those trying to be a woman, tend to
describe things in the abstract, which makes diagnosis so difficult. Males
tend to detail descriptions with similarities so that a comparison can be
made. Unfortunately, the two sexes don't always fit the usual pattern.

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